With Her Fists

Chapter V-1

Chapter VBiloxi, Mississippi

March 21, 2010

The alarm clock went off and they awoke to the Kings of Leon belting out s*x on Fire. Last night's experience ran through Clarice's head in vivid emotion and she started laughing. Ace obviously had the same thoughts because he was laughing and singing along as he got out of bed.

“Your s*x is on fire!” he sang, playing air guitar and stepping around the room like he was performing for a crowd. Except a guitar wasn't what he was slinging around. He had absolutely no butt, and his narrow hips made his p***s seem comically out of proportion. Like it could eat peanuts out of her hand.

She laughed harder.

He turned. “What?”

“Nothing. It's just that, well, did you eat Corn Flakes as a kid?” she asked with a big-eyed innocent look, already knowing the answer. She sat up. The blanket fell down, bunched under her bare breasts.

Ace looked at them and waggled his eyebrows. “Corn Flakes? Nope.”

“Oh, that's right. You ate Noassatall Flakes.” She looked at his hips. “Gigantic bowls of it.”

“Hey, who needs a butt when you have this?” he responded, holding his `this' in both hands and playing a solo on it. “Your s*x is on fire!” he jammed, dancing around again. He was really getting into it, whipping it up and down like Hendrix at Woodstock.

Clarice laughed so hard her eyes had rivers pouring out at all corners. She wanted to spend the rest of her life right there, feeling that exquisite joy. “Oh man, that's good stuff.” She wiped her eyes. “You won't win any mainstream talent shows, but I think you have a bright future in adult comedy. Let's set up a stage with tiki torches. We'll put on grass skirts and I'll drum on your coconut knees while you play your instrument.”

He stopped and his eyes closed and opened slowly, head shaking. His fingers gestured at her. “It won't work.”

“And why is that?”

“We would need a bass player. A bass guitar is bigger than a regular guitar. Where are we going to find a bigger guitar than mine?” he said, face serious again, gesturing at his crotch like it was the tallest skyscraper in the world.

“And the ego has landed.” A fit of giggles grasped her and she lay back on the bed. Oh man, that's good stuff. She sat up again. “I could get a strap-on, but the competition might —”

“And we would need a singer,” he interrupted, pretending he hadn't heard the solution to finding something bigger. He turned and walked to the bathroom, the sight of his no-butt dropping her back on the bed giggling once more. He gave it a smack, then yelled, “And you can't sing!” The shower turned on.

Clarice jumped up, laughter cutting off. “I can too sing!” she yelled back, a little girl in a My Daddy Can Beat Up Your Daddy argument. She stormed into the bathroom, slammed the door, tagged Ace with a quick combo to the body that knocked him off his feet in the tub. He fell, flailing his arms and ripping the shower curtain off the rod, thumped down on his no-butt. Water cascaded from the shower head, bouncing off his legs, sprinkling on the floor. The Giggle God struck her down again and she tumbled into the tub with the cute jerk.

* * *

Their bedroom was quiet, dark, with the comforting aromas of hygiene products and natural scents that accumulated from a couple's active life. It was their sanctuary, a chamber with no technology to distract from sleeping. As a fighter, she'd studied the science of the body, so she knew how important quality sleep was for recouping sharpness in the nervous system, for mental and physical keenness. Deep sleep is important for so many bodily functions. So that's all they did in there.

Well, and play air guitar…

The bed was large, low to the floor with white pillows against a black wooden headboard, huge white comforter, rumpled, hanging half off the mattress onto the gray carpeted floor. The thirty-foot square room had dark blue and white walls, two dressers with mirrors, black wood, and a small walk-in closet. Relatively bare bones.

Wide awake from the energizing shower, they dressed in work clothes. Clarice really didn't care for traditional mechanic's uniforms of dark blue. That's all good for shops that service factory cars, or whatever. But a custom shop like they ran was highly artistic, and she believed their uniforms should show more style than the usual, boring attire.

So…

She got with a friend that sewed for a living and designed Custom Ace and Tattoology uniforms with a blue camouflage base. Blue, gray, and white deals. The mechanics had combat-type pants with Custom Ace logos on the side cargo pockets, and zip-up tops with logos on the back. There were plenty of random sized pockets and matching mechanic's gloves. Her top had a MIG welding machine for a name badge backdrop with CLARICE in wicket tribal letters. Ace had a diagnostic machine name badge, their painter had a spray g*n, and so on, each employee labeled with their specialty.

Clarice's tattoo artists, who would open the studio after noon, had blue camo shorts for the guys, a skirt for the manager, and tank tops to show off their tatts while advertising Tattoology on the front.

You know the famous statue of soldiers raising the American flag on Iwo Jima? The Custom Ace logo was soldiers raising a wrench. The Tattoology logo was a soldiers raising a tattoo machine. The colors matched the building and went with a theme that they are soldiers of creation.

Bring in any tatt idea or car idea you can imagine. Their soldiers will create it.

Down the stairs they went. The thick cedar wood lacked the creaks and squeaks that plagued older steps. The sheetrock walls were dark blue and bare except for a huge Avatar movie poster halfway down on the right. The only light was a black light overhead that made the Avatar's eyes and skin glow with unnatural blues and greens. Shampoo drifted up from her man's freshly scrubbed hair. He paused at the poster, turned his face up to her and did an uncanny impression of the Avatar. Mouth wide, eyes large and glowing. He grinned. His teeth glowed green.

Stepping off the stairs into the hallway, turning right, they walked through a heavy steel door that insulated the tatt parlor from most of the incredible racket they made banging on cars. Ace held the door, a perfect gentleman, closed it with a click of the latch and snip of pressurized air, sealing the quieter half of the building.

He inhaled and his look went all dreamy. “I love the smell of diagnostic machines in the morning.”

“I hate to tell you, Bread Stick, but that's the smell of burnt diagnostics this morning,” rumbled a black man in a blue camo suit, walking up to them, cleaning his hands on a rag. BOBBY stood out from a paint spray g*n on his name badge. Taller than Ace and a hundred pounds heavier, he looked and sounded like Vingo Rhames, if Ving looked like he just stepped off the Mr. Olympia stage. All Bobby needed was posing trunks and oil.

“Uh. Okay. When you say `burnt'…” Ace said, looking at Bobby like a kid who was just told his favorite pet had been murdered.

“Burnt means just that. When I opened the shop and turned the equipment on, your girlfriend growled and spit sparks at me. The transformer circuit is blacker than I am.” Bobby smiled at the look of pain that took hold of Ace's face.

The poor guy ran off towards his machine yelling, “Daddy's coming!”

“No running in the shop, you i***t!” Clarice yelled after him, grinning.

“Now that was some funny s**t,” Bobby told her. He stood with hands on waist, staring at his running friend with a big silly smile.

She looked at his arms. They were as big as her legs. “What?”

“His face. That geek really thinks those machines are his babies.”

“They are,” she defended her guy. “He created them, gave them life.” She patted the soldiers and wrench logo on Bobby's side pocket.

“If you say so, Boss,” he rumbled, smiling and walking back to his work station, a paint booth surrounded by tables full of paint and body tools. His chuckle sounded like a 500hp CAT engine.

She did her morning inspection. Walked from station to station to make sure the apprentices had cleaned and organized the tools, and also to check on the progress of various projects. Everything looked spectacular.

The shop was a hundred and fifty feet long and one-hundred feet wide, with six bays and five car lifts. Huge red and black Craftsman tool boxes towered next to the lifts, with black air hoses snaking down from the ceiling and around the boxes to rest on metal work tables. Pneumatic tools and bench vises on one table drew her eye. Certain tools had the ability to ensnare her on sight. To attract interest with their scents of petroleum, amazing geometry and unique capabilities. Each station had a mélange of oils and degreasers that glistened from forged steel, twinkling with the promise of lighting up the innovative half of her brain, if only she'd stop and pick something up. She swore she could feel it tingling right then.

Or maybe that was just the fumes.

The twenty foot ceiling with I-beams overhead held rolling electric wenches that were used for everything from lifting car engines to holding an employee upside down for a birthday s******g. They even had Bobby's big a*s up there one day.

A grinder suddenly clicked on with an air whine, buzzing a wire wheel on metal. The 20hp air-compressor added to the racket, cranking up its thump-pump to replenish pressure in the reservoir. Bobby, standing in front of an old Chevy with a clear face shield strapped around his muscular head, ground rust from a bumper, sparks fanning.

A white Pontiac GTO drove up to the side of the shop. Clarice guessed it to be a 2005 model, factory spec, but still kickass. She motioned for them to pull into an empty garage bay. The two men in the car waved and nodded, backed up and drove the Goat into the shop, rattles and clangs from one seriously disgruntled drivetrain reverberating loudly. She winced, looking at the poor car with a feeling that put a heavy frown on her face. God, like seeing a sick animal that would be a wondrous beauty if someone would just mother it. She wanted to give this car some TLC, a quirk she indulged every time high-end wheels rolled in there.

She walked over to Bobby, who had put aside his work to attend to the customers. He was explaining a delay and technical problem to the two men who stood in front of their car looking like characters from Miami Vice, white dress pants, pastel shirts, and all.

“…but the diagnostic specialist is here now,” Bobby said, nodding toward Ace, the muttering nerd with dozens of colored wires strewn over his lap, shoulders, head inside a huge machine. “He'll fix the machine in no time and we'll scan your car for the problem.”

“We need the car working by lunch, Señor,” the guy in the peach pastel said to Bobby, looking nervous about something. Possibly intimidated by Bobby's presence. Lots of customers were. “We have an important meeting we cannot miss. I will pay you double if you will hurry, por favor.”

Bobby's eyes widened just a tad at the mention of a double payment. He blinked and Clarice heard, cha-ching! Bobby said, “I understand, sir, and we will do that for you. But we have to wait –”

“Bobby, don't sweat it,” Clarice said. “I'll take care of these guys. Have to do it the old fashioned way, but hey, these gentlemen are offering incentive for the effort.” She smiled at them. “First-class service for two first-class gentlemen.” Pay us double? Go to the front of the shop, sirs. They smiled back, relieved, stroked by her charm, happy that they would make their meeting on time. She could sense they were seriously scared of missing it, and were willing to go to great expense to avoid that fate.

Hmm… Two Mexican dudes with deep pockets of cash, a boss car, going to a meeting of consequence.